The Trick is to Keep Breathing
by Quietly Making Noise
Summary: Always the one who has to track her down... Another exploration piece, this time the 9th Doctor and the TARDIS: what she thinks of all this companion business.


**Title**: The Trick is to Keep Breathing  
**Author**: Guess…  
**Disclaimer**: "Doctor Who and TARDIS are trademarks of the BBC". Lyrics and title from the song of the same name, © Garbage.  
**AN**: 9th Doctor. If I had the access to Christopher Eccleston, I'd have cobbled a music video to this. As it is, please excuse the interspersed lyrics and minor emotional content.

∞ ∞ ∞

_She's not the kind of girl who likes to tell the world about the way she feels about herself.  
She takes a little time in making up her mind. She doesn't want to fight against the tide._

The Doctor reached for his trusty hammer and thwacked the rebellious console hard. 'Behave!' he roared, frustrated at the concern that was making him so angry with his longest companion. And his newest was in grave danger at this very moment, and the TARDIS wasn't co-operating! It was as though she was…

A machine, jealous?

The Doctor scoffed at himself, trying the switches to his right one after another. He could have sworn the TARDIS' protesting groans were disapproving. 'What?' he shouted above the whining engines. 'What am I supposed to do? Let her _die_?'

He kicked the console savagely, the pain smarting his foot going unnoticed. 'You're so _fickle_!' He was forced to pump the handle furiously to avert another stall.

_But lately, I'm not the only one. I say, Never trust anyone.  
__Always the one who has to track her down - maybe you'll get what you want this Time around?_

The Doctor flew around the consoles again and tried the tracking system. 'Rose Tyler,' he said clearly, above the moaning. The screen flickered reluctantly. 'Come on, come on!' He pounded it, feeling the last shreds of his normally iron self-control slipping away. His hearts were pumping faster than he could ever remember them. Adrenaline coursed through his veins.

_Can't bear to face the truth - so sick he cannot Move - and when it hurts he takes it out on you._

His fingers began to tremble. Time was passing, as it inevitably did. Every nanosecond lost, the more the probabilities of Rose dying mounted up. The scales would have to tip at some point. Sweat beaded on his furrowed brow. A word he didn't understand leapt out of his mouth, bypassing his brain. A calm, rational part of himself supposed it was an oath. He threw himself at the consoles, savagely trying every trick he had ever known to _force_ the TARDIS behave herself.

_The trick is to keep breathing._

And then he realised that was where he was going wrong.

_She knows the human heart, and how to read the stars. Now everything's about to fall apart…_

He took a mental step back and observed himself. Anger. Frustration. Concern, above all, concern. Fear? Possibly. But he would have to rise above all this emotion. His intense blue eyes closed as he concentrated and reached out to his dearest friend. The whining faded to background noise, as though he had submerged under water. Time slowed as he let his consciousness mingle with the organic-synthetic half-mind that was the TARDIS. His TARDIS.

'I'm sorry,' he whispered, his voice carrying through the noise like a ribbon through smoke. 'But I have to find her. It's my fault.'

It's always your fault.

'I know.' Remorse and sorrow welled up inside him. 'I'm sorry,' he said again, opening his hearts. 'I'm so sorry…'

Tears made him squeeze his eyes; made him crush his pain. It always went wrong, but he always pulled through. It was some unwritten, unconscious agreement with the universe: it had to be. Nine hundred years, with all he'd been through, half of which he only dimly remembered, and he had cheated death so many times.

At a cost.

He sensed something peculiar in the TARDIS. Some flicker of electricity that conjured the strangest image.

A smile.

A strange, almost knowing smile. An understanding smile. Perhaps she understood him better than he understood himself.

_I won't be the one who's going to let you down. Maybe you'll get what you want this Time around?_

He opened his eyes with a smile, a tear falling from his cheek onto the grated metal floor. 'Thank you.' He laid his cool hands on the throbbing metal of the console, letting his gratitude flow down his arms, all the while whispering. 'Thank you, thank you, thank you…' The whining engines took on a different tone, almost eagerly pounding away at the continuum to search out Rose.

_I won't be the one who's going to let you down. _

The screen flickered and flashed up: a schematic map with a flashing location.

_The trick is to keep breathing._

He could have kissed her.

∞ ∞ ∞

**AN**: In retrospect, this appears to explain my intense dislike of Doctor/Companion relationship pieces.


End file.
